May 24, 2008

Ever since I opened this blog about a year ago, I had the intention of using it as a place to reflect on and give a bit more insight into my working process. While I was working on the painting "Backward isn't Forward," I took pictures each time I moved on to a new piece of the painting or made changes. Below is the first "Process Animation" of many to come. Hopefully I'll learn a bit more about the production side so I can make a video of a higher quality in the future.

The video is only 5 seconds long, but believe me, it took a lot longer than that!

May 12, 2008

After a little more than a month of painting frantically (10-16 hrs a day) Artomatic 2008 is finally open and last Friday night’s opening was a lot of fun. The organizers estimate that 5,000 people passed through and among them were a bunch of my friends and family (thank you for coming!).I talked to a lot of people that night, so it’s a bit of a blur, but I had some really good conversations with people about my work and had a chance to catch up with artists Matt Dunn (see his strong portraits of DC residents and tourists in the southeast corner of my floor), Chris Bishop (see his very cool paintings of robots and girls on the 12th floor), Scott Brooks with Mike and the family (who just opened his really great solo show at Long View Gallery on Saturday the 10th), Marcie Wolf-Hubbard (see her colorful mixed media collage paintings in the southwest corner of my floor), Pat Goslee (see her colorful layered abstract painting in the southwest corner of my floor) and met Sean Hennessey (see his mixed media glass sculptures in the southeast corner of the 7th floor).This year I'm really happy with my space and the really great artists that are in the same section as me. Given the wide range of work on display at Artomatic and the nature of the space selection process you never can be sure what kind of work will be right to you and whether or not you'll find a good location in the building. This year however, I lucked out big time when fellow artist Emily Greene Liddle organized a bunch of really talented artists and picked out an amazing space on the 11th floor across from one of two bars in the whole building. So yes, I’ve got a great space and am right next to some really great artwork (thanks Emily)! They are: painters Alan Defibaugh on the partition next to mine, Candace Keegan and Emily Greene Liddle on the partitions across from mine, and Jared Davis around the corner with his black wall and 8 ft. tall Venus space goddess.If you missed the opening, please come by this Friday, May 16th for “Meet the Artist Night” and say hello. There will be some wine, snacks and plenty of art to see!